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population growth — English
An increase in the number of individuals in a definable group. In a statistical sense a population could consist of non-living objects (such as motor cars) or living individuals (such as elephants or fruitflies) (see “population density”). Since Geography concerns itself primarily with the spatial relationships between human beings and their environment, we normally think of human beings when we read the term “population”. The number of people in a specific group within a definable space, may increase by means of migration (see “migration”), or by the birth of new individuals. The latter is called natural population increase, and different populations increase at different rates (see “fertility”). In some cities, countries, regions or nations more individuals (babies) are born than in others, consequently the natural population growth rate in the first-mentioned population is higher than in the others. Since human populations differ greatly in terms of size and characteristics, it is difficult to compare and make scientific defensible inferences about the population growth rate in vastly different populations. To overcome these problems, certain standardised statistics and indeces (indexes) are used to express population growth rate. Crude natural birth rate (the actual number of babies born to each 1 000 people in the population) is one such statistic and it is probably the most commonly used statistic to express population growth. Annual growth rate is another, but that includes migrants. A number of other statistics could also be used to describe population growth, so we must carefully select the most appropriate statistic or index to express population growth rate. There are many different factors that might influence population growth rate: culture, religion, health status, medical facilities, governmental actions and laws on the number of children per married couple, financial considerations, migration, internal political instability (see “political instability” and “malnutrition”), war, disease, and many more. Many African states have high annual birth rates, but owing to some of the mentioned factors their population growth rates might be relatively low (see “fertility”). When more people move away from a place than those who are born or into it or migrate towards it, the population growth might even be negative. Some of the Western European countries (eg Norway, Sweden, Denmark and France) and even Russia, have negative population growth rates and their populations are in fact declining! The United States of America is always an interesting and rather surprising example of a country with a high population growth rate: the natural population increase in the USA is low, but the medical facilities are excellent, no famines or uncontrolled diseases occur, more than enough food is available for every member of the population, the human development index (HDI) is relatively high, and so forth, but the reason why the USA has the highest annual population growth rate in the entire world is inward migration of people from all over the world. So while some Western European countries and Russia have declining populations, the USA has a ballooning population!
